Hacker News Reader

> When the arguments on all sides are fully aired, the group is most likely to come to a wise decision.

This assumes both sides are acting in good faith and share some common goals. If one side has (say) convinced itself that the the other side is evil and duplicitous then this no longer works because 1) everything the other side says is viewed through the lens of evil and duplicity and 2) this evil and duplicity needs to be combated by any means necessary, up to and including presenting arguments that the first side knows are wrong but which it believes in good faith could allow it to prevail against evil and duplicity.

And then there is the meta problem, which is that as soon as one side falls into this hole it typically drags the other side down with it.

I find this is more likely as the argument gets more abstract. But when two sides are trying to deal with an aspect of reality that is staring them in the face, it's much easier to get practical.

Yeah, that's what I used to think too. But recent events have falsified that hypothesis. It turns out that people can maintain some shockingly deep disagreement about the nature of reality.

This motivates smaller / local over bigger / global groupings.

Yes, but the problem with going local is it doesn't handle externalities well, and technology has made the planet a lot smaller than it used to be so these are getting harder to just ignore.

That's not what I'm talking about - by "staring in the face", I mean aspects of reality that are immediate. Which usually means smaller scale. I agree regarding things like climate change, democracy, and viruses though.

You will find that there is a surprising amount of disagreement over what is actually staring you in the face. Some people will insist that (for example) if you just look around you, any sane person will see irrefutable evidence of intelligent design, and that if you think about this logically you will be led inevitably and irrefutably to the conclusion that the Bible is the inerrant Word of God, Jesus is coming Real Soon Now (tm), and in the meantime He has sent Donald Trump to deliver the United States of America from commie pinko liberal atheists. And if you don't accept all of that then there is clearly something wrong with you.

There are literally millions if not tens of millions of American voters who at least profess to believe in the substance of what I have just written. Maybe they're all just trolling but I doubt it. I just have a hard time picturing them saying, "Ha ha, April fools! You didn't really think we were serious, did you?"

If the "wrong" side seems malicious and it is clear-cut who is right, the "right" side shouldn't need to abuse debate.

They can go meta and debate the goals first, then use logic to reason what they suggest objectively works. If the "wrong" side is unable to provide equivalent reasoning for their points, then it's obvious?

And if the "right" side is unwilling to go about it systematically and wants to engage in warfare, perhaps that speaks for their confidence in themselves.

There is no right and wrong side here, there is only your side and the other side. Both sides think they are the right side and the other side is the wrong side (obviously).

Debate works when each side thinks that the other side might have something worthwhile to contribute despite being wrong, even if that contribution is nothing more than capitulation. But if the other side is evil (rather than merely wrong) then even capitulation is no longer a viable option because evil cannot be allowed to merely resign and go about its business. Evil must be eliminated.

> There is no right and wrong side here, there is only your side and the other side. Both sides think they are the right side and the other side is the wrong side (obviously).

Obviously. That's why I put them in quotes. I was just following the example in your comment where there is a self-righteous "right" side, and the "wrong" side is wrong from their perspective.

I think the shared goals consensus and the logical reasoning I described is what makes it painfully obvious to wider public if there is true malice. Why not the "right" side use it?

Only if it has been shown in this way that the wrong side is actually wrong, but the imperfections of the system let them act and do evil, then warfare (which is what you seem to be describing, more or less) might be the next step.

> I was just following the example in your comment

No, you weren't. I very deliberately avoided the use of the words "right" and "wrong" to describe the two sides.

What other classification is even a possibility when you paint one side as "evil"?

Whether the evilness of the "wrong" (with quotes) side matches reality or is a product of the non-evil ("right", with quotes) side's fallible model of the world was unclear from your comment, and I left it as such.

It looks like you aren't arguing with my main point, which is applicable to any side that thinks it's "right". I sincerely hope this approach prevails over abusing debate mechanics that you describe.

You are missing my point. Once one side decides the other is evil, it stops being about right and wrong (in the sense of objectively correct or incorrect). Re-read this:

> If one side has (say) convinced itself that the the other side is evil and duplicitous then this no longer works because 1) everything the other side says is viewed through the lens of evil and duplicity and 2) this evil and duplicity needs to be combated by any means necessary, up to and including presenting arguments that the first side knows are wrong but which it believes in good faith could allow it to prevail against evil and duplicity.

and pay particular attention to the passage that I highlighted here.

I am pretty sure I got that in full.

My point it is not an inevitability, if it happens it is at best regrettable and preventable, at worst the self-righteous side is in fact being the evil one by abusing the truth seeking mechanism.

> In a group debate, nobody has to (or even should?) change their minds. It’s okay to have different priorities and think different things are best. Debate is not about admitting fault or changing one’s mind – it’s about informing the rest of the group about which arguments one thinks are salient to the judgment.

This hits at a key problem in dysfunctional companies ... since there is often no clear "right answer" people will do dysfunctional things like delay decision making until there is a clear, unambiguously best choice (which may never happen) or force through their preference because other, better, choices have trade offs.

Back when I was a product manager, no small part of my job seemed to consist of making a decision--ANY decision--so that things could proceed. Often it fairly obviously didn't matter and, even if it somewhat did, there was often no clear way to inform an optimum answer. (Of course, sometimes there was--but it was probably the minority of the time.)

Also, a prompt decision can also get the team to the point where the decision is proven wrong and one of the other decisions correct or, as is often the case, a separate best option becomes obvious.

it also fundamentally incorporates "disagree and commit" as an ethos.

there's no need or requirement for consensus for the community to move forward; there's only a need to acknowledge that the community must go one.

The model assumes the voters are Bayesian.

So, kind of like the efficient markets hypothesis, you have to ask "under what conditions will deliberative debate lead to better decisions?" Because sometimes the group makes the wrong decision.